


Shut its Mouth on the World

by jesterlady



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Angst, F/M, Happy Ending, One Shot, Stream of Consciousness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-03
Updated: 2011-10-03
Packaged: 2017-10-24 06:29:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/260161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jesterlady/pseuds/jesterlady
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Buffy's thoughts during S6.  I wrote this to be about what she was thinking during Spike's 'every night I save you' speech, but it gradually flowed into what it would be through the whole season.  And because I crave happy endings, the nasty stuff didn't happen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shut its Mouth on the World

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own BTVS. The title is by Charles Williams

She could hear his words. They were beautiful words, flowing in just the right cadence. Words designed to melt the heart without any such intent by the speaker. She dully supposed that what she’d overheard Giles saying was true. He was a poet.

She wondered why the words had no effect on her. Was it because of who was speaking them? If it was another of his kind, the one,  
standing in his place, would she succumb and feel? Was it because of what he was? Did his words have no merit because there couldn’t be any  
basis for them? No, what she’d learned while she’d been away had taught her differently. The problem was with her. It was with this world,  
this harsh place where everything she’d ever loved had become her enemy. All her friends' voices were a grating sound, needy and complaining  
and loud and full of humanity, sucking life. How ironic that the one who needed to suck life only ever seemed to give what they took.

She watched his face, full of emotion. Could something dead look that alive? Could someone without a conscience seem to be the only  
one who knew the right thing to do? It seemed so. Life’s cruel tricks. It took being dead to understand them. She knew that now. He’d  
always known it. Now she was equal to him, yet he was more alive than her. Again, so ironic.

Despite his words, they were quieting to her. The jarring noise that surrounded her every moment was less around him, even when he  
talked for hours. It was talk designed for her, not himself, as everyone else’s was. It was interesting and distracting and yet, never veered  
from the fact that she needed those things and he understood that. It was terrifying. At least, it should be. But she had no energy to be  
afraid. No emotions to feel. She was numb.

If only they knew how much she tried. If only they knew why she had to try, but how could she say it? That much she remembered from her life before. You couldn’t hurt people you loved with their mistakes. Maybe, in some small way, it was for herself. It was sacrilege to speak of it except to him. It would have hurt. Maybe she should do it then. It would be painful, but it would be feeling something. And she couldn’t feel anything.

She was determined not to go that route. Not to hurt to feel. It was easier with him, silent, talkative, always present, never  
insisting, asking, needing, like they did. Their constant need for validation, praise, comfort, justification was horrible. Some seemed to  
feel it more than others, and those would be the ones she’d always been closest to. That almost hurt. But she wasn’t there yet.

She would be. She could tell. The numb feeling would be gone and then there would be pain and emptiness and how she would deal with  
that she didn’t know. It didn’t seem feasible. Except when she looked at him. Hadn’t he gone through something like this before himself? No  
more nonsense about the person being dead, she knew that whoever he had been before was still there, still had a chance, and that person was  
the one who always talked to her when she came to him. Not to say it was the same it had been, not that she would have known, but she knew  
anyway. She’d been there herself. She’d seen the secrets and what many people would have envied of her, she regretted more than anything in  
the world.

Would it end if she ended? Would she find herself where she longed to be? Funny how one could want something with every fibre of  
their being and still not feel a thing. But thoughts like those were dangerous and she turned from them. He spread a hesitant hand in her  
direction as if sensing her thoughts and she mustered all her strength for a small smile of reassurance. It was hard, but easier for him.

One day she might be able to tell him what he was doing, how he might regret not saving her, but that he had. He didn’t need to  
imagine saving her every night, he did it in actuality. She swore to tell him one day.

Then the pain and the reality was more than she could bear. Why did there have to be matter and glaring heat and need, such need? It  
was worse than hell. No wonder Angel had been driven mad. No, she was more than mad, she was beaten and dry and wrathful and emptier than the  
desert and twice as full. She was a paradox unto herself and she smiled grimly. Wouldn’t Giles be proud? But then he wouldn’t know because  
he wasn’t here.

She was abandoned and that’s what she wanted because people made her hurt. People needed her to give what she did not have. Yet, when  
they did go, it was just as unbearable. How could she stand to be alone with these thoughts, with the knowledge that she now had? How often  
she was driven to seek him. And he never questioned, never needed to know. It was almost heaven. No, it wasn’t, but obviously the best this  
hellhole had to offer. Not that she could fault him for that. He wasn’t even supposed to know anything about heaven. Yet he was hers.

One day, he made her laugh. It was like waking up from a restless sleep that was deeper than a dark ravine. Like breathing freely  
after being underwater. Like telling the truth or slaying a hell god. And the best part was that it wasn’t a ploy. Wasn’t something designed  
to maker her conform to the picture he had of her or the way he wanted her to be. That had been too often. She’d tell him that too. One  
day.

She still couldn’t talk of it to anybody but him, but now she could talk. She could smile and slay and dance and be responsible. It now felt right to do that, but she couldn’t talk about it. The resentful glances she received were resented as they were received. What right had they to judge when they had brought this about? She pushed thoughts like that to the back of her mind. Humans, that’s what they were, no matter their powers. They didn’t know the grand purpose or the smaller, divine secrets. Not their fault. But he knew.

She wished herself dead less and less. She found herself glad to be among the living. Strange how he was counted among the living.  
Even the foremost among them. He could never truly be dead to her again. He who had made her live. It was so hard. She doubted she’d ever  
be free of it being hard. Never could she forget what she’d learned. She didn’t want to. She was at the point where the pain of remembrance  
was worth the lessons learned. Oh, it had been wrong. She shouldn’t have had to relive these lessons here, but treasured them in the arms of  
true peace. Now she had his arms. Not to be compared, but that wasn’t his fault and what did it matter anyway?

Then she could tell him. He smiled like his heart was beating, but she didn’t even care if it did. It wasn’t important. He’d never  
needed validation before, well, never showed the need, but she could see how important it was to him. And it made her feel better to want to  
give it to him. He’d been a good teacher. His touch was passionate, and it gave her fire and strength to want to live. But it didn’t take  
away from his words or her desire or the steady presence he gave. She didn’t know if some things could ever happen. But then she’d never  
known she could feel alive again.

They walked, handfast, and she found she was living a life worth living.


End file.
